Malotke Sews

Norwescon 48 is happening April 2026 and each year they host a Single Pattern Contest. Last year was my first year attending and I was mainly focused on my panels and workshops. I had time to take some artsy workshops but I didn't know about this contest until during the convention. More about the contest, from their website : "Each year, the Single Pattern Contest challenges creative, sewing, and crafting skills by choosing one pattern as the basis for your creativity! The object of the competition is to create a one-of-a-kind creation using this pattern. Some adjustments or changes to the pattern are allowed as long as the end product reflects the original pattern. Norwescon is excited to announce the two pattern options for this year’s Single Pattern Contest: this Hooded Duster Coat or McCall’s Misses’/Men’s Lined and Unlined Cape (M4139). Competition awards will include, but are not limited to, best workmanship, best use of convention theme, and best in competition. Awards...

The MoPOP hosts an annual Fashionably Undead Halloween party. It's one night & has a costume contest, late night open exhibits, food & beverages, and DANCING. Also photo ops and other cool things like a scavenger hunt. This past year the theme was "The Goopening" and I was invited to be one of the Costume Contest Judges. It was a blast! First off, what a surreal experience. I loved seeing how creative the attendees were and everyone that entered the contest was excited to show off their work. We had a few items for judging criteria and there were a LOT of entrants. Overall, I loved seeing everyone embody their characters / costumes. The top five got to do a little runway walk to show the audience and then the winners were announced on stage as well. Since I love a good excuse to do a costume AND I was one of the costume judges I felt like I needed to make a fun goopy look for the evening. BUT it also had to be something that I could drive in, sit for a long period...

Okay, apparently it's been basically 3 years since my last post here. A lot has happened. Mainly that I switched gears and went from putting all my focus on costume design to all my focus on writing. But, even with the switch, I've been working on sewing projects. I've definitely missed costuming shows. One of the big things that happened - I got to combine my love of costumes, fashion history, and body horror! My first horror poetry collection was published with Green Avenue Press back in August 2023. Fashion Trends, Deadly Ends Take a journey through a gruesome history of fashion. Rib removal, poisonous dyes, sewn eyelashes...the cost to stay in fashion. From head to toe, Brianna Malotke tells the tales of deadly fashion trends in history through beautiful poetry. It was a lot of hard work but I loved researching the history and figuring out what to pick to focus on for the final collection. I had a few smaller sections that were actually cut from the final book. Each sec...

The Dire Circle - " The circle is dire, much like the outcomes of these stories. In this black zodiac themed anthology, you may come to dislike other people...maybe even yourself."   When I pitched an idea for "The Dire Circle" during 2021, I wasn't sure that it would even get picked. But, once it did and I was given a Black Zodiac to then develop my short story, I decided to do what I do for costuming a character - I made a mood board for my main character.  My Black Zodiac was the Serpent and my short story for the anthology is Twisted Tales, Dripping in Honey . My story centered around a very femme fatale main character with lots of buried secrets. I looked to old Hollywood glamour, dark reds, demon eyes, and other glints of seductress mixed with sweetness to create Melia . For me, coming up with a name was very difficult. After creating what should would look like, having an idea of her voice, her outfits, her drive, everything about her, I still needed the...

Here is a quick breakdown of how I made a padded armor piece for the character Tilly when she's her D&D character, Tillius the Paladin, in the play, "She Kills Monsters."  For reference, here are my Tillius the Paladin Mood Boards: First step was using the actor's measurements I created a very basic front and back bodice pattern. I wanted the armor piece to be comfortable, slightly bigger, and the padded would provide the texture look I was aiming for with the overall piece. It would be worn over a long sleeve t-shirt and the actor would be wearing a belt over it that held the sword. Also worn over top would be a one-armed shoulder armor piece that would be black leather with silver accents. So, while a majority of the outfit was black (base layer, boots, belt, gloves) I wanted this armor piece to be more grey and scream texture to the audience.  Above: I cut out the front and back pieces in the grey fabric for the outer layer as well as striped fabric for the li...

Guess who got new headshots done? Me! I've been continuing to submit various written pieces (poems, drabbles, flash fiction, short stories, etc.) and have been needing headshots for some of the submissions. Since I have been using my photo from senior year of college (shot for the fashion show program) I had decided that maybe it was time for some new, and way more recent, photos.  Pictured left is one of my favorite photos from the photography session. I've already updated my website using a bunch of the photos and I've sent them off for social media / marketing for upcoming interviews & anthologies that I'm included in.  Here is a link to my writing website: Malotke Writes

In "She Kills Monsters" there are two evil cheerleader characters, Evil Gabi & Evil Tina. For this show I wanted them to have almost identical outfits for when they played the evil versions. Their look included matching cheerleader outfits, shoes, little black horns, and wings. Then one girl would wear black contacts and the other would wear sunglasses (she couldn't do contacts). This post is about the wings. For the wings I purchased two sets of two sizes of black wings. Then I removed the black glitter elastic straps from all the pairs of wings. Next was placing the small set on the "top" of the larger set. I had to hand sew them together due to the wiring in the wings & the thickness of the wing material.  See above for a photo on sewing the wings together. After sewing the two sizes together I cut and sewed new, white elastic straps to the wings. The cheer tops are white so I was hoping to hide the elastic as much as possible. After that the wings we...

  Halloween catnip bags were made! Basic instructions: 1. Cut out rectangles (9 inches long & 5 inches wide) 2. Fold in half with fabric facing inside then iron 3. Sew two sides shut (1/5 inch seam allowance) & leave top unsewn 4. Turn inside out 5. Fill with desired amount of catnip 6. Turn top down, stitch top shut - machine "top stitch" or by hand  

I will be the Costume Designer for the upcoming production of She Kills Monsters at the Second Stage Theatre at Parkland College. The show is written by Qui Nguyen and directed by Michael O'Brien.  Some Insight into the Show from Parkland : Revised 2016 edition. She Kills Monsters tells the story of Agnes Evans as she leaves her childhood home in Ohio following the death of her teenage sister, Tilly. When Agnes finds Tilly’s Dungeons and Dragons notebook, however, she finds herself catapulted into a journey of discovery and action-packed adventure in the imaginary world that was her sister’s refuge. In this high-octane dramatic comedy laden with homicidal fairies, nasty ogres, and ‘90s pop culture, acclaimed playwright Qui Nguyen offers a heart-pounding homage to the geek and warrior within us all.

Currently a work in progress , this is one image of the fire gloves for the Witch in "The Kingdom of Dreams: A Tale of Oz." Using conductive thread I was able to hand sew a controller, 9 LEDs, and a mini on/off button to each glove. The actress will be able to use the on/off switches on the thumbs on the gloves to control the lights. My husband, who is a software engineer, is programming the LEDs to create a fire effect in red. There will be a thin glove worn over these so that the LEDs and controller will be hidden. The LEDs are very bright and will be able to be seen through the second layer. Once the programming is in place I will share a video of the gloves in action. Stay tuned for more special effects!

This week's book review is on a book that one of my good friend's just surprised me with recently! It's "The Complete Book of Sewing: Dressmaking and Sewing for the Home Made Easy" by Constance Talbot, edited by Isabelle Stevenson, and published in 1949. I have a small assortment of vintage sewing books that I started collecting in college. I knew that for our senior year we would have a table to display our portfolios, other work, and decorate however we pleased, in addition to our senior collections. Pretty much from my freshman year on I had a general idea of the theme and color scheme for my senior collection. One of my ideas for my table was to use vintage books as props to add varying heights to display photos and other apparel works (such as the corset I made while attending the London College of Fashion).  This lovely book has loads of chapters with everything from picking the right fabrics to how to baste to time-saving details and pockets. Each chapter h...

Today's book review is on Valerie Steele's " The Corset: A Cultural History ." When I studied abroad my Junior year of college I attended the London College of Fashion (LCF) for a semester. How they operate their study abroad semesters is that you take 3 required classes and then you get x amount of hours to choose other classes. For my three classes I elected to take Shoe Design, Millinery, and Corsetry. A big part of my corsetry class was keeping a sketch book / research book. Well, if there's one thing I love it's research. My corsetry book was full of notes and images (See image below)! My sketching isn't the best but man oh man can I research. I loved LCF's library, Purdue had basically no fashion books available and LCF was filled with any topic you could want to look into. I spent a lot of my free time in the library reading books, collecting images, typing notes, and making wish lists of books I would want to purchase for my own home library. I...

This week's book review is a pattern making book focused solely on menswear! Gareth Kershaw's " Patternmaking for Menswear " is one of my favorite menswear patterning books. It's made for with professionals and students in mind, and provides an excellent step by step guide for different classic menswear patterns. I thoroughly enjoy the layout of the book. First it starts with short introduction to patternmaking for contemporary menswear. It describes how "working on these garment silhouettes you will learn the basic principles of patternmaking" and can then use those as your building blocks to alter and create your own patterns (Kershaw). I like how the introduction walks you through menswear over the years and how silhouettes have changed. After this you're given five chapters that encompasses the entire process for you. Chapter One focuses on the prep work for patternmaking - what you should have, what the different terms mean, how to take measurem...

Today's review is the Design Museum's " Fifty Dresses that Changed the World ." First published in 2009 by Conran Octopus Ltd, the text is written by Michael Czerwinski and has been reprinted a couple of times. At a little over 100 pages, this little book is a great reference for iconic dresses that any costume designer or fashion designer should recognize. I really enjoy the variety and the feeling that it does capture the dresses that did in fact change the world . The layout of the book is consistent with information and descriptions on the left and a lovely photo on the right. The book description explains that each dress appraisal explores " what has made their iconic status and the designers that give them a special place in design history" ( Amazon ).  The book is in chronological order for the dresses they selected to feature. It opens with the Delphos pleated dress from 1915 and then carries on over the decades and it ends with an LED Dress by Husse...

All three jackets. A few weeks ago I received an amazing gift from my husband's family - 3 vintage fur coats/jackets and 2 fur hats. I was over the moon excited about them. When his family offered them I was ecstatic at the chance to have some real fur options in my costume collection to use for future shows (when everything opens up again). At the moment I just have them in garment bags hanging in my office and the hats are in a hat box. We are in the process of redoing our garage and creating a better storage space for us, and once it's finished I will have the appropriate space for costume storage. Ideally I will have my own mini costume collection of basics and one of a kind pieces that I can use in shows.  Each jacket is different and it's really exciting to have these new fur options in my closet. One is a long white fur coat with an extra slip of fur (I assume for alterations). The tan colored brown one is shorter than the white fur coat and the two hats match the co...

I'm sure your social media feeds are full of face mask posts, but I  just wanted to share a few more pictures of some of the fabric face masks I made for co-workers, family, and friends. Above is a progress photo from a blue and white geometric printed mask I made where I was super happy with pattern matching around the slit in the middle. Pictured above are three black and white masks I made for family in Canada. There are two types of plaid and a lovely houndstooth one as well. All of my masks were made using the method I posted about: Project Homemade Face Mask . They're all breathable, cotton fabrics that are double layered and pleated. The slit in the middle allows you to add a filter to your mask for extra protection. 

This past week I finally got around to making a tie blanket out of fabric I've had in my stash forever. Probably last year I had purchased the black and white Jack Skellington fabric as a remnant from Jo Ann's when it was on super sale. Recently, to make my way through my stash I figured out what projects I could reasonably finish in the next few months and what materials I needed in order to finish the projects. I had decided I wanted to make a tie blanket using the Jack Skellington fabric, so I needed to purchase another fabric to make the fabric. Originally I had planned on just getting a plain black piece but once I started browsing the store I decided on a fun Christmas themed fabric with the Nightmare Before Christmas characters: Jack, Sally, and Zero. I think it's a super fun blanket that works for both Halloween and Christmas. It took about an hour overall between cutting the fabric to be the same size (the employees that cut fabric don't always cut it straig...

A recent addition to my book collection is "Style" by Kate Spade, edited by Ruth Peltason and Julia Leach with illustrations by Virginia Johnson. It's a small book that is divided into three main sections: Style & the World, Style Start to Finish, and Maintaining Style. It also has a cute section at the very beginning that is titled "Have You Ever Wondered...?" and provides you with some brief responses to typical style questions you may have been asking yourself over the years. For example, there's the one about wearing white after Labor Day, but also a few answers to questions such as mixing fine jewelry with costume pieces and how to pack your finer tops to avoid that wrinkled look. Overall it's a nice take on Kate Spade's take on style and her own personal experiences mixed in with beautiful watercolor images and relevant quotes from other designers, authors, and more. I've always loved Kate Spade items. The brand is colorful, mixes print...

Above is a close up on the neckline. I used a solid black knit for the neckline to really stand out against the red poppy pattern. After finishing the neckline I just needed to finish the hem! Since it was already serged, I decided to just roll the hemline up and zig-zag stitch it in place. The final look! The top is a little big overall, but I like the length of the short sleeves. If I made another top I would make the top a little more snug and I would move the peplum up the waistline about two inches to work better with my body shape.  For this top I used a test pattern I received a few years ago, the Parker Peplum, as a sloper in a way. After I had laid the two pattern pieces out on the fabric, I changed the underarm/side seam curve. I also did the sleeves and neckline differently than when I created this top the first time: Pattern Testing Part 2 .

After going through all of my fabric I decided to make a couple of simple styled tops to add to my work clothes closet. I have a pattern for a peplum top that has just 3 pattern pieces (cut two of each: front/back, sleeve cuff, and peplum). I chose a stretchy red, black, and white poppy print fabric from my stash and started working on the top. I laid the fabric out, pinned the pieces, and cut everything out. Then with everything cut out, I started to pin stuff together and run it through my serger. Pictured above is a snapshot of me pinning the front and back sides. After serging the side seams together I serged the sleeves and the cuff pattern. Then I rolled and pinned the cuffs and hand sewed them to the serged seams. I serged a black ribbed knit to the neckline and then, like the sleeves, rolled it and pinned it to the serged seams to then hand sew together. After this I just have the hemline to finish!  I'll post a picture of me wearing it once the hem is finished.